<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Rescue Party, but no Rescue, no Party by Tuunbaq</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28995366">Rescue Party, but no Rescue, no Party</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tuunbaq/pseuds/Tuunbaq'>Tuunbaq</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Terror (TV 2018)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Cannibalism, Dubious Consent, Gen, Hope vs. Despair, M/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 10:34:57</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,008</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28995366</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tuunbaq/pseuds/Tuunbaq</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Lt. Little's rescue party leads to the worst kind of sorry.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Edward Little/Solomon Tozer</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Lieutenant and Sergeant Gift Exchange</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Rescue Party, but no Rescue, no Party</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tish/gifts">Tish</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="western">Eyes closed, Edward counts the regrets of his life. It takes a while, for there are many, large and small. All he wants is to keep his eyes shut, to keep his mind off the biggest, most tragic regret.</p><p class="western">The boat chain cuffs dig into his wrists, bringing his mind reluctantly back to the present. Someone grabs him and slaps him hard, sending him tumbling from his prone position on his knees.</p><p class="western">“I asked you a question.” Hickey's voice has a thin line of seething lurking below the placid delivery.</p><p class="western">Eyes open now, Edward stares into the scene of his remorse. The dead still lie where they fell, a grotesque tableau arranged on Hickey's stage. Hickey's standing in the midst of the carnage, like an actor awaiting applause, roses strewn at his feet.</p><p class="western">Edward can't speak, he can only close his eyes, expecting the next slap that comes across his face, but instead is dragged away to a tent.</p><p class="western"> </p><p class="western">“Edward.” It's Tozer speaking, and the sting of familiarity makes Edward open his eyes and glare up at him.</p><p class="western">An echo comes to him. <em>That's your name, isn't it? </em>An echo of a throbbing head wound makes Edward dizzy for a moment.</p><p class="western">Tozer sets down a bowl with a sliver of water in it and dabs a dirty, ragged cloth in it. “Doctor Goodsir should be doing this, but he can't now. Not since you got him killed,” he says with a weariness Edward's never heard before.</p><p class="western">The damp cloth barely makes an impression on Edward's bloody wounds, but it soothes him a modicum. Soothes in body, but not spirit.</p><p class="western">“At least we have enough food to go on with, now.”</p><p class="western">Edward flinches back at this, staring into Tozer's eyes. There's a small amount of light and life left in them, almost totally driven out by Hickey's poison.</p><p class="western">“They're dead. We're alive. We'll survive because they're dead,” Tozer states, and Edward wonders if perhaps he's trying to convince himself of this justification. “You could have come with us. Before. You would have saved their lives.”</p><p class="western">“Then they'd be alive, and we would starve, since we couldn't eat them,” Edward says viciously. “I mean, by your own logic.”</p><p class="western">Armitage pokes his head cautiously through the tent opening. “I'm to call you for dinner, Sergeant.”</p><p class="western">“Thank you, Private,” Tozer picks Edward up as he rises, supporting him with a firm grip.</p><p class="western"> </p><p class="western">Armitage lingers and takes Edward's other arm as they go over to the large table. There's a repeated sound of something crunching and crushing, of metal against wood, just out of sight as they approach the remainder of the mutineers. Edward finally gets to see what he's been hearing and nearly collapses as des Voeux slams his boat axe down on a corpse. Edward stares in horror at the malicious glee that contorts des Voeux's face as he chops up the body. Edward can't even recognise who it is – <em>was</em>, and tries to identify the body by their clothing, piled in a heap nearby, focussing on a piece of shirt just to gain a sense of what this pile of meat used to be.</p><p class="western">Armitage awkwardly ushers Edward to a tea chest with a chipped blue plate and silverware set upon it. “They used to be Hodgson's, but he won't be needing them now,” he says, almost apologetically.</p><p class="western">Edward despondently slumps to the rocky ground, lethargically taking in the scene. “This is insanity,” he mutters over and over.</p><p class="western">Hickey's voice is like a nail to his head as he calls out from the head of the main table. “Sergeant Tozer, let the lieutenant have first choice of our meal today.”</p><p class="western">Edward can barely look up as Tozer brings over the rusted tray bearing the meat, shale crunching underfoot as he walks, mimicking Edward's own soul as it shatters.</p><p class="western">Tozer stands so his body blocks Hickey's view and lets a few pieces of meat slide onto the plate, the red bold against the blue pattern. “Survive,” he whispers.</p><p class="western">Edward stares down and thinks of home, thinks of green fields, and of open seas, but every image is blurred as though behind a veil.</p><p class="western">He doesn't even bother with the knife and fork, just takes a slice and pushes it into his mouth. He catches sight of his shaking, reddened hands and shudders, swallowing down his humanity, swallowing down the shadow of a human.</p><p class="western"> </p><p class="western">It's dark now and the cuffs still bite into him. Edward twists the chain and lets the pain wash over him.</p><p class="western">“Don't feel guilty. You made the right choice.” It's Tozer's voice, quiet and insistent as he enters the tent and settles down beside Edward.</p><p class="western">“Choice.” The word rings hollow on Edward's lips.</p><p class="western">“You chose to live, be alive,” Tozer urges, his body pressing closer in the dark.</p><p class="western">Edward feels the heat between them and nearly faints. “How can I be alive when I'm dead?”</p><p class="western">A hand presses on his chest. “You don't feel dead.” It drives down his body. “You feel alive.”</p><p class="western">Edward's heart races at the touch. “No!”</p><p class="western">Tozer's whole weight pushes down upon him. “That feels alive.”</p><p class="western"><em>That</em> being Eward's prick which is now filling with blood, aroused by Tozer's touch.</p><p class="western">Tozer's voice burns in his ear. “Be alive, Edward.”</p><p class="western">“I'm dead inside.” Edward's voice is like slowly melting ice, his prick burning into his body as Tozer pumps at it through his trousers. There's a flash of cold as Tozer unbuttons him and presses flesh against flesh, then the heat intensifies.</p><p class="western">He feels like burning meat now, and Tozer's about to devour him. <em>Eat and survive</em>, he'd said, but who is going to survive and who shall burn? He's as stiff as the dead still lying out there in the cold air, his surging prick betraying his wish for death, for ice cold eternity and blackness.</p><p class="western">Edward's protests melt and mute inside the heat of the first kiss. He doesn't regret leaning up into the kiss now. He's half dead, half-alive now, and he twists the clanking chain to make his choice between them.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>